Skydance lands rights to Mike Hammer book series, eyes a future film

[BluBonnet]

Skydance Lands Rights To Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer Book Series With Plans To Develop A Feature Film Around Iconic Private Eye

Skydance has acquired rights to Mickey Spillane’s and Max Allan Collins’ Mike Hammer franchise with plans to develop and produce the bestselling book series as a feature film based on the iconic character. No writers, directors or actors are attached at this time.

Entertainment 360 joins as a producer with Skydance’s David Ellison, Dana Goldberg and Don Granger producing with Guymon Casady producing for Entertainment 360. Benjamin Forkner and Ken F. Levin will also produce. Collins will executive produce, with Jane Spillane serving as co-producer. Carin Sage will oversee the project for Skydance.

Hammer is the protagonist of a series of hardboiled detective novels, starting with I, the Jury published in 1947, becoming one of the most popular figures of the genre.

With more than 250 million copies of Mike Hammer books sold globally, it is often recognized as the most popular American mystery/thriller series of all time. Hammer is credited with inspiring numerous other characters including Dirty Harry, Jack Reacher and James Bond (who Ian Fleming famously referred to as “the British answer to Mike Hammer”).

The producers have the rights to the Hammer catalog which includes dozens of stories, books and graphic novels authored by Mickey Spillane as well as those co-authored by Spillane and his friend the best-selling author Collins, who wrote Road to Perdition.

The Mike Hammer novel Kiss Me Deadly was adapted into the classic 1955 film directed by Robert Aldrich and starring Ralph Meeker as Hammer. In 1999, it was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress.

The character has not had a chance for any feature film treatment thanks to a long-winded rights dispute. Spillane passed away in 2006, one month after the death of his manager Jay Bernstein. Bernstein’s estate claimed ownership of the Hammer character. Levin spent several years in court before the rights came back to the author’s estate and a clear title could be delivered for a movie deal.

Casady and Forkner are also teamed to produce another adaptation that stars an iconic literary character, Tom Ripley, in Netflix’s upcoming series based on Patricia Highsmith’s The Talented Mr. Ripley. All episodes are being written and directed by Steven Zaillian.